Month: May 2017

Countless times in the news, especially in recent years, we hear about countless tragic celebrity deaths. Yes, it is quite the tragedy which is countlessly portrayed by many of the major media networks. However, the fashion in which it is reported is subjectively classless, especially when considering the “credibility” of said news networks.

As seen in the picture above, the New York Times had put out an article titled, “Chris Cornell, Soundgarden and Audioslave Frontman, Dies at 52.” Seems harmless enough to a numbed society to this type of celebrity death. However, I take great issue with this and the network’s inability to take advertisements away from the article. Maybe its just me being overly offended by something like this, but if I were to die, I would like to know that I wasn’t being made into the next money-making story. And, obviously, this would change if ad revenue made on the story was donated to my loved ones. However, nowhere in the NY Times article do I see a disclaimer supporting this (if I am wrong about this, please let me know because I don’t want to be right). It is a real shame that in a society with unprecedented media distrust that this type of thing goes unquestioned.

I do not want to make this solely about the Times because if the NY Times is doing this, then I can guarantee that other major news outlets are on their coattails. Without any research I could definitively say this. And this exists in all forms of news. On the television, for example, the network won’t postpone advertisements when announcing the deaths of any person, celebrity or not. And my main point isn’t that reporters should be barred payment for writing these articles. My goal in writing this is to shed light on an issue that has been vastly, and wrongly, numbed to society.